Shawn Geller, the CEO of Quikly, says his company helps companies expand their customer databases through online promotion.

Aaron Eckels for Crain's Detroit Business

Shawn Geller of Quikly started his pitch with a video clip of a crowd in a store awaiting the 10-9-8 countdown before the official start of Black Friday.

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Old school met new school Friday morning at the pitch contest that was held at the College for Creative Studies in Midtown on Day 3 of the first Detroit Homecoming even put on by Crain’s Detroit Business.

Old school was represented more than ably by Sam Valenti III, always looking like a million dollars in a tailored suit, affable and funny as he introduced the new school component, four area entrepreneurs with companies on the grow.

Valenti was a pioneer of venture capital in this state back in the 1980s, likely before one or two of the new-schoolers had even been born. With him as head of the investment committee for the state’s pension system, Michigan was a pioneer in what is called alternative investments, that is, hedge funds, private equity funds and venture capital.

He was a co-founder of the Michigan Venture Capital Association, has invested personally in local VC funds, and as a honcho at what was then known as Renaissance Detroit was the creator of the Renaissance Venture Capital Fund, which under Chris Rizik has grown into two funds with more than $105 million under management that have invested in numerous out-of-state funds now doing business here.

To the new-schoolers, venture capital is a fact of life, a given part of the entrepreneurial equation, something whose existence they take for granted, hard as it may be, though, for them personally to get VCs to write them checks for their startups.

Three of the companies making pitches have direct ties to VC, in fact, either through Dan Gilbert's Detroit Venture Partners VC business or Bizdom, his startup support and incubator operation — Gingotree Inc., Quikly and Cribspot LLC.

The fourth company was Detroit-based Walker-Miller Energy Services LLC.

They all matched him for enthusiasm, especially Scott Hasbrouck, Gingotree’s co-founder and CEO.

Valenti told the audience to put down their smartphones and pay attention. He said the entrepreneurs were going to get seven minutes each to sell themselves and their companies to the audience.

“To you,” Valenti told the audience, “this is just another thing before lunch and then you’ve got to catch a plane to go home.”

But for the presenters, telling their story was crucial. It was only seven minutes, but think of how important seven minutes can be in certain contexts, said Valenti.

Think of the time it took to ask your girlfriend’s father if you could marry her, he said, old-schoolishly.

Think of the first seven minutes of a job interview.

“Think of an IRS audit. 'Dude, I thought that was deductible,' ” said Valenti.

“I will film your raggedy asses at batting practice tonight at Comerica Park if you don’t pay attention,” he said, referring to an event Crain’s lined up for the expats, courtesy of the Tigers.

Valenti needn’t have worried about anyone falling asleep. Hasbrouck was passionate in describing how as a Ph.D. student teaching undergraduates in Georgia he got the idea for his company, which has licenses with major textbook manufacturers to let professors assemble custom-designed online course materials at big savings over textbook prices.

The last of the three licenses he needed was signed last Friday, he said, “with this scrappy startup in Detroit. In Detroit, we can do s---,” Hasbrouck said, using a shorter word than excrement.

Walker-Miller told how a business that sold components of the electric grid before the recession nearly went broke before reinventing itself as a company that does energy audits for businesses, finds out where they are wasting energy and then sells them equipment to fix the waste.

But it wasn’t easy or without turmoil, she said, flashing a photo on the huge TV screen behind her that she said summed up things as she was trying to save her business. It was a photo of her curled up in a fetal position in a chair, sucking her thumb.

The audience roared.

Jason Okrasinski of Cribspot caught everyone’s attention with a shot of a city street after a big snowfall. Cribspot, a Bizdom graduate that began as a course project in business school at the University of Michigan, helps university students find off-campus housing online instead of pounding the pavement, and helps mom-and-pop property owners market their rentals, manage leases and collect rent.

Shawn Geller, the CEO of Quikly, another DVP company that helps companies expand their customer databases through online promotions, started his pitch with a video clip of a crowd in a store awaiting the 10-9-8 countdown before the official start of Black Friday.

At zero, they charged the same bin of merchandise in a frenzy.

“They’re $5 headphones. Last week they were $2.50 and no one wanted them,” he said.

When the pitches were over, Valenti told the audience how to vote for a winner and, summing things up, said, pointing to Hasbrouck: “As our former Ph.D. candidate and poet laureate said, “S--- is happening here.”

Ginkgotree was the winner, which didn’t surprise Ted Serbinski, a partner in DVP who has described Ginkgotree as the epitome of scrappy companies and entrepreneurs you want to invest in. DVP put up $500,000 of Ginkgotree’s seed round of $750,000 last year.

Scrappy? In 2011, Scott and his wife, Lida, Michigan natives, decided to return home to start their company and got incubator space in the Tech Brewery in Ann Arbor, building some of their office furniture and Dumpster diving for the rest.

Eager to tap into the growing entrepreneurial buzz in Detroit, they decided to leave Ann Arbor and are now one of DVP's fastest-growing companies.

As for the name of their company, back in Georgia, Scott and Lida were strolling through a farmers market and found themselves surrounded by leaves from nearby ginkgo biloba trees.

“We noticed how unique the leaves were shaped,” said Scott. “Also, ginkgo trees have traditionally represented learning and growth — the things we wanted to represent.”